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There are some songs that give you goosebumps as soon as the intro kicks in. Here are 5 of my favorite artists.

1. Motley Crue - Live wire, Looks that kill, Dr Feelgood & Primal Scream (many more)
2. Slayer - South of heaven, Raining blood
3. Iron Maiden - Wasted years, Aces high
4. Sex Pistols (and subsequent covers) - Anarchy in the UK
5. Metallica - Unforgiven, Seek and Destroy, One

Each of these take me to a time, a place, an acquaintance and a memory. With the exception of the Sex Pistols (RIP) and Metallica (RIP?) to memories of live venues and my first concerts seeing my idols live in the flesh. Not surprisingly, these are also songs that survive the test of mood; it's entirely possible to listen to them in a happy, sad, pissed or indifferent mood. The songs survive and will be there for you. And it all starts with that intro on a guitar. 

Genius !!

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All of India awaits, nervously, the HC verdict today on Ayodhya and the rights of the land that came into conflict 19 years ago. Having said that, it's also important to remember it probably came into conflict earlier when Moghul marauders invaded and conquered most of the land (via force not intellect). The Indian media has characterized this as the verdict on Ayodhya, not of the disputed land ownership within a district of UP, what was once part of Ayodhya the kingdom. This slightest stretch of the vernacular is an important one not to lose sight of. Like the verdict of the Ram Setu, it has characterized this as a verdict on the source of the story itself, the god, the legend and therefore the faith. Gullible as the people are, we've bought into this characterization completely.

We also follow keenly the list of Bollywood filmstars pleading for peace, for harmony and for unity. Of course they would. Who'd go watch expensive movies if people fear for their security and the police impose curfews? No doubt a few like Amitabh Bachchan, who is from UP, have more genuine intentions, but I'm sorry, Indian moviestars who've cheated on and left spouses, driven over sleeping beggars, been arrested or caught with possession of controlled substances, caught speaking with underworld dons, whose world tours are financed by shady racketeers, and in possession of Ak-47s aren't counted amongst those I get my dose of daily morality from.

The point is, I cannot imagine all this tamasha (drama) happening elsewhere. I do not see at any point during our lifetimes, a high court verdict being entertained, let alone passed on 'Jerusalem', 'Mecca', 'Sri Lanka', 'Malaysia', 'Indonesia' or any other land that houses ancient marvels of religious and spiritual importance, that may have been superimposed with a more recent structure, of the same or another millenium, of equal religious importance to someone else. It just won't happen. The 'Ground zero mosque' controversy is the most recent example of a similar argument, this time in the West.

That India's even this far along, is proof enough to me that we're secular. Secularism isn't the forced, judicial, or social subjugation of any one group's faith/religion at the cost of another's and I reject Mahesh Bhatt, the far-right amongst the RSS and others for suggesting it. It isn't even a religious tolerance. Tolerance, while lovely sounding, is pathetic, and below what we are capable of as humans, when you dissect the word's meaning. To paraphrase Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, tolerance is a hesitant and/or unwilling acceptance of ideas, thoughts and cultures, usually different from my own, often underlining the hesitant and unwilling part, while subscripting the acceptance part. Ask yourself, why would you have to tolerate that which you readily accept? You only tolerate that which you cannot stand. Mutual 'respect' and not tolerance is what we should be striving for instead. Respect for those of other religions, cultures, ages, tongues, nations of origin and sexual orientations. 

I respect every Hindu's, Muslim's, Parsi's, Christian's, Sikh's, Jew's, Baha'i's, Buddhist's, Atheist's (and others I've inadvertently left out) right to practise (or not) their religion for themselves and their families. I equally respect and adore India for being different than every other country in supporting an individuals right to do so for the last 1000 years. That should be our pledge of religious allegiance.

Everyone knows Ayodhya for what it is, the way we know what Nazareth, Jerusalem, Mecca, Gaya or Amritsar are. Will I, as an Indian, be respected, tolerated, or neither, for thinking so? I'm afraid to find out.

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(Written 26-29 January 2010)

A most reassuring sign that India's time has come is when the President of the United States, a country strong and independent for 235 years, speaks to his people, sternly, of competition with India, a country and civilization while much much older, independent from foreign rule for only 62 years. Comparing GDPs, defense budgets would be a futile exercise, yet he sees a challenge. 

A best friend of mine from Ireland, controversially, once spoke of a longing past-desire to have had Britain rule Ireland for a longer period of time. While that instantly made him unpopular with his fellow Irish, his point of view was that a lot of the land and religious feud would not have happened, economic reforms would have taken place faster and that over time the Irish would've learned to self-govern. This is an extremely popular view of past colonies, India and Hong Kong are probably no exception.

What would that have meant for India? Perhaps better roads, better infrastructure, better civic sense and responsibilities, lines, order, sterile and hyper-safe environments? Just keep in mind, there is no country anywhere in the world that has managed to embrace the glories of the past with the opportunity of the new. Japan has all but relegated any spirituality to private sanctuary. China is doing well in embracing both, but tilted heavily toward the new. Greece failed at both making it to the present and retaining the old. Only India is doing well at both and should continue to do so. While the lack of Infrastructure, water, civics is difficult and depriving they can be built. A recollection and sense of who we are, who we were and the gifts we've presented to the world cannot be rebuilt from memory. Our identity as a republic has always been independent and separate from outsiders. 

I think independence from Britain was one of the best things to have happened to India. Taxation without representation, suffrage, child education are not trivial issues. I suspect these issues would have remained India's bane much longer had the British stayed. Now primarily child education and poverty remain as THE challenging issues.

I, however, do not pay taxes to the Indian government. At least, not yet. And so, I have resigned my opportunity to speak any ill, since I do nothing to improve the situation. For me, its home.

Just thinking through, let alone writing, a company business plan is immensely challenging and difficult. The leaders of 1948 had to take advice and counsel from all corners of the country, judicial and personal, and come up with the constitution of India. Some of the leaders were killed, some of them died before they saw the dream come alive, others were not good leaders and yet others brought up change in future generations simply by the power of their thought. All this not long after each arm of the country was further separated into unimaginable borders. It may not be perfect, and in some cases the constitution may even be outdated. But it's what we have and we should be proud of it. It came after almost a 1000 years of slavery. And we're seen as scary competition in just 62.

Happy 60th Birthday Dear Republic.

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An amulet I always love to see on someone's desk is the laughing Buddha. 

While meant to be powerful, this particular form is usually presented as small, rotund, drunk-happy and jolly in appearance. These are some of the most highly sought after souvenirs in China and Nepal and are available in all sorts of materials such as wood, teak, rosewood, sandalwood etc. Some believe a vigorous 'rub' of the Buddha's tummy bestows luck on the individual doing so.

Having attended Bal-Vikas and other theological classes during childhood and having read and attended discourses on the world's religions, something about this presentation of the Buddha is very ironic to me.

Briefly, prince Siddhartha (Buddha's original name), was taken aback by the wealth of suffering and pain that existed just beyond his palace walls. He decided that he needed to understand the source of such suffering. In order to do so, he proceeded to subject himself to varying levels of physical and mental deprivation. These included fasting without food or water, sleep and other rigorous disciplines. He then learned that it wasn't necessary to subject oneself to such pain in order to experience some truths. These were then expressed in the four noble truths, and the solutions to these, in the noble eightfold path.

Basically, someone who fasted, tortured himself and abstained from any worldly pleasures, could in no way have ever been short, rotund and the way he is portrayed in these symbols. 

So, the next time you see a Laughing Buddha, go ahead and rub the tummy. But think about some of the wisdom in the four truths and eightfold paths, and then remember it isn't meant to be as jolly as it appears. 

At the least, the 'right concentration', 'right mindfulness' and 'right livelihood' portions of the eightfold path would probably have an issue with 'luck', i.e. money or other material requests, bestowed by simply rubbing the Buddha's tummy. He probably wouldn't have gone for that.

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Wanted "Senior Engineer - 4-5 Yrs Experience, proficiency in java, sql, oracle, ...xyz....etc." Sound familiar? Imagine if every (tech) position was written in this way. Would we have qualified at the starting points in our careers? Probably not. Someone took a chance with us, lowered their expectations and we met them. Someone definitely took a chance on me. We grow and we evolve. Our spouses and parents see this every day of our lives in our personal realms. We're nowhere near as able and capable as we can be. And we were worse years ago. And they know it. :)

At work, it is a deeply rewarding experience to hire someone that you feel is a risky bet because of their lack of experience. They're eager, excited, not as jaded with corporate life and are a breath of fresh air to everyone around them. They make mistakes, slip and fall, but so do we. They'll need to be corrected and will occasionally give you the deer-in-headlights. We all do that, they're just newer to the game thats all. But they're so eager and the stakes really are low and they recover faster than anyone else. In two years an investment like this pays off. If lacking in experience, when hiring look for aptitude, thinking skills and interest.

One of the most nerve-wracking experiences for techies is attending a job fair. I've attended several of the largest tech job fairs in the country, in and around Santa Clara. It is an absolute tech meet market. Getting two questions from a company after your 30 second pitch is a minor victory. When fresh out of college, premium watermarked paper costs a lot. And after handing out all those resumes, you're lucky if you get a handful of calls back. I was so eager to start working after these experiences that I taught myself on nights and weekends on my first job. I know I paid off on my investment.

Don't expect someone like this to be with you forever. This is just an even exchange. They give you their best, eager, manic, caffeine-rich, near-24 hour days of their lives, and you give them much needed experience, maturity and help them grow. It's important that both move on at some point, but enjoy the experience while it lasts. Help them with communication, business writing, meeting etiquette and other softer skills that no body teaches you in college. If the person is any good, you'll find yourself relying on them more and more as time goes on. That means your investment is paying off.

Narayana Murthy, founder of Infosys, in one of his speeches once said (paraphrased) "All of us are the fruits of a tree somebody else watered. During our lifetimes, let's promise to water another tree, so new fruits may bloom."

Words to live by.

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Forbes had a good list that I captured here. Many colleagues came up to me though, immediately after, and suggested I add a few more. So, by popular demand here is another roundup of some painful jargon. Part deux (faux french and euro terms strike me as needing to be on the list too).

"Deep Dive"

If you're not in the navy or in mining, this term is off limits for you. What it really means in geek terms, is to get more technical, in the weeds (see below) or to simply add more details, usually of a technical nature. Let's just call it for what it is. "Can we have a more detailed discussion please?"

"In the Weeds"

Managers, are most guilty of this one. It's their way of remarking to themselves or the attendees, and simply asking the rhetorical question, "Did anyone get what I said?". Just prior to this is the customary third degree technical questioning completely inappropriate for a larger managerial meeting. Multiple versions of this term exist. The most heinous office-space versions involve people in the room, I kid-you-not, pulling out an imaginary weed whacker (Yes I know) and making a motor noise like so - RR-R-R. Really.

"Parking Lot"

A meeting consultant must have come up with this in the last five years as part of his/her unique vocabulary. Ever since it's made a cunning appearance onto the scene, it has become the catch-all for discussions that are usually not relevant to the meeting at hand. Oddly, if you pay attention, sometimes the person who calls "parking lot" i.e. requesting to defer an item for discussion, is the very person who digressed the discussion to begin with. People tend to have chats in a parking lot only to resolve fender bumps and nicks, or if in the midwest, to stock up on ammunition, so if in a meeting, call it for what it is. Not bloody relevant. This term needs to be euthanized quickly.

"Strawman"

Basically if I propose a complete hack, want to request feedback without being humble enough to be open about it, or don't know what the bloody heck I'm doing, I'm working on a strawman. If I just say I need help people surprisingly always offer to help. I just don't call it a strawman.

"Synergy"

If there's one term that's driven us techies up the wall over the last decade, its synergy. When someone means "I want what you have" or "I'm going to learn a lot from you" or "my people/tools/processes suck, yours are awesome, HELP" before or after "I'm going to acquire you", they cannot be honest about it and would rather say "lets find or explore synergy". It's one of those words that's morphed from a noun into a verb and adjective. Please stop with the synergies.

"Leverage"

Like synergy, leverage came into everyday business vocabulary as if our primary occupations involved the use of fulcrums and levers. I wish it did. Those were simpler times. I know the words 'use' or 're-use' don't sound complex enough, but that's really all we're doing. Let's just say that. Developers reuse things all the time. You'll never hear me say "let me leverage xyz's xml processing library". I'll reuse it.

"Traction"

Again, if not in the chiropractic or spinal disc realignment business, you've got nothing to do with traction. All you need to say is something is gaining acceptance, popularity or wider support. That's all. It's okay to use simpler words. Really.

"Google it"

This is an up-and-comer, but every bit as irritating. When someone wishes to impress upon you the very outer limits of their researching capabilities this is the term that is used. Usually it means they did a lazy search, and captured the first piece of data (not knowledge) they could find. I have a hard time placing my trust in someone who just read something 5 minutes before I do. I prefer expertise. 

"Agile"

I'm working on a follow-up post just dedicated to this term. It has morphed from a set of principles from career programmers into an entire industry. It encapsulates and justifies everything from lack of design, insufficient documentation, poor requirements, collaboration over expertise, non-linear amounts of waste and sometimes poor practices, all in the name of delivering smaller pieces of value quicker to the end-client. The focus continues to be on getting 'agile' vs. delivering value using agile principles. There is more confusion than clarity on this one topic, and entire forums of software people bemoaning the state of agile affairs, and when the word itself is used as cover for anything and everything, it makes itself into the realm of jargon. Getting back to basics and rethinking is highly called for on this one. 

Notable Mentions : "Bucketize", "Gap Fitment", Any permutations of the list above.

Ultimately this post is about making our meetings and our work environments more productive and accessible to all. We all have lots to contribute towards each other and to improve the quality of our work, but all of these terms serve as downers and meeting filler material at best. Jargon like these only help meander an otherwise meaningful discussion for no apparent reason. Some of these terms have existed for a whole decade. It is unacceptable. Let's take back our work environments from the consultant-speak, and bludgeon these terms into permanent oblivion. There is a reason the second S in KISS stands for stupid.

Now that's what I call synergy.

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I used to get petrified of these meetings. At an earlier stage of your career, you're less likely to be involved in these sorts of meetings and so you're less likely to know how to deal with them. Just know that over your career there is a transition of first being scared, then confident, then knowing what your outcome will be and then finally getting to be the executive who decides the outcome i.e. the H or F part. Let's first define what this meeting is.

It's the sort of meeting where something fundamental is about to change, and you are single-handedly the cause for that change. It is most definitely not a status meeting, a platform meeting, an update meeting or any kind of regularly scheduled meeting. It also isn't a panic, pin the blame or root-cause analysis meeting. It most definitely isn't a technology-related meeting. It's much more.

When you present something fantastic, uniquely value-adding, a proposition that could get people above you in hot water, or stand out by challenging the status quo of business, that's when you have a GHOF meeting. When you challenge basic assumptions, organizational models, executive wisdom, redefine competition, identify new business opportunities, or all of the above that's GHOF at it's best. You have to identify something, typically a problem or five, a host of solutions, investments or deas and tie all the pieces together. You're basically identifying something no one else thinks about - and because you have - are implicitly or explicitly applying for any opportunity that arises out of that. The untold assumption is that you're suggesting status quo isn't an option, and so if not given the opportunity to solve the problem, what else exists?

I like these meetings because it reduces outcomes to two fundamental options. Green light, red light. No amber. It dramatically increases odds of success to a guaranteed 50%, gets you visibility, makes you known as a non status-quo'er (there are too many of those) all while painting a giant 3-d bullseye on your back. Things will change for you. Guaranteed.

I'll follow up with tips for one of these, but I try to work on at least one or two of these a year. That means at least three-four ideas you have to discard in the process. Desh Deshpande, of Sycamore Networks, famously used to recommend his employees always go on job interviews at least twice a year. That way they know what they're worth, aren't afraid of taking risks where they are, and can dive headlong into an opportunity without worrying about unemployment. They know they're good enough. They just found a job elsewhere to prove it. I recommend if you don't or can't head down the entrepreneurial path, try to create for yourself at least 1 GHOF meeting a year. It does the work soul much good.

Oh, and if offered cake at one of these meetings, never refuse. 

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See the full gallery on Posterous

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Avatar is undoubtedly going to be all the rage this weekend and at water-coolers next week. (That and the foot of snow the nor'east is getting)

For those who think this is a concept that second life, Facebook or Cameron has pioneered, here's some background.

The weight of Indian religious belief is shared equally by three paths, or margams. Bhakti (the path of devotion), Jnana (the path of intellect or knowledge) and Karma (the path of action). There are entire volumes of work, ashrams and gurus that have pontificated on the depth and breadth of each. These have been gathered through verbal traditions, written leaf manuscripts and experiences passed down from thousands of generations ago.

Jnana-margam is the subject of the Vedas and Upanishads, the most popular reference material for Indian philosophy. Much of latter-day Buddhism can be attributed to the purest wisdom of these pages. Karma-Marg, the source of many of the forms of traditional Hatha Yoga is described in great detail in the Bhagavad Geeta. It is a series of discourses given by Lord Krishna to his disciple, prior to the greatest war mankind has ever seen. Bhakti-margam is probably best captured in the Srimad Bhagavatam-Purana, a collection of episodes, happenings in the every day lives of citizens long ago, that describe the glory and omnipotence of Lord Vishnu. That is the source of the Avatars, dashavataram, because there were ten of them.

Because qualities like righteousness, justice, equality were lost on mankind for successions of years, through a period of yugas (several thousand years), Lord Vishnu was beseeched by man to deliver  mankind from unspeakable evil, disaster and destruction. Through a series of Avatars, or physical representations of the ultimate form, the lord appeared and rescued his devotees each time. The Avatars - Matsya (Fish), Kurma (Tortoise), Varaha (Boar), Narasimha (Lion), Vamana (man), Parashuram(Warrior), Rama (King), Krishna (man), Buddha, Kalki. All except Buddha and Kalki appeared in previous yugams or ages. The Avatar of Matsya which came about thousands of years ago is the tradition upon which the later-day "Noah's Ark" is based. Think about how one tradition from another region many years ago was repeated in another land, thousands of years since. It is NO coincidence.

One slight variation on the avatars is that some don't recognize Buddha as an avatar but rather Krishna's brother Balaram (an avatar of Adi-Sesha). Ultimately though each avatar promised and delivered salvation, blessings and hope for mankind in the face of certain catastrophe.

For those interested in an incredibly pious and sacred English rendering of these tales, Srimad Bhagavatam by Kamala Subramaniam (here) makes for a great read. Treat it with respect though, read it in seven days and prepare for some remarkable goodness to come your way. The power of the Bhagavatam, proven over generations, is that when read with respect it purifies and bestows blessings upon not just your house, but those of all of your neighbors, and your seven subsequent generations. 

Online avatar creation sites like face your manga or second life might get a lot of traffic this weekend, as people try to figure out how they can get one. The avatars described are an incredibly pious and sacrosanct concept though. It is just worth respecting that the concept of the Avatar came about several thousand years ago, in another yugam, or time, obviously much before this movie, James Cameron, Facebook or James' namesake, the J.C. I'll be sharing that and the movie review at the water-cooler.

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..there is a woman. Or so goes the adage. My version and story differ just a bit.

I am blessed with three women in my life. 

My mother. She has taught me to be always be honest with my emotions and never be superficial, to live within and accept your means, to love and live for your children, and to help those less fortunate. Unfortunately, India has an abundance of those less fortunate, and ever since I've come of age, all I can remember and see to this day are efforts she takes to help those downtrodden ones. "Help ever, Hurt never" is her life's motto and she goes to great lengths to live this. I have seen first-hand the unshakable power of prayer, belief and the force of the Lalita Sahasranamam or Narayana Bhattatiri's ode to the Lord of Guruvayoor, Kerala, the Narayaneeyam. She personifies the Bhakti-Marg or path of devotion and unbelievable events have happened for our family because of that devotion.

My wife, undoubtedly the smart one, was educated at premier institutions around the world incl. MIT & Cambridge. She had a great career and put that on hold for our kids. Her reason for doing so is to provide an environment for them, at least as good as one our mothers provided for us. She is my sounding board on every aspect of my life and I make better decisions only because of that. She helps me understand subjects that I have a tough time grasping, like micro/macro economics and social development, that come naturally to her and I am wiser for it. Because of her, I know who Austan Goosbee or Paul Samuelson (RIP) are and how their work shaped our lives. My intellect is better formed because of her.

My daughter, my fountain of renewal, teaches me to just let life be. She knows how to let the truly insignificant pass from memory. No event is as important as the one currently being experienced, and that's good enough. That is also the essence of Zen. She wouldn't know, that's just how she is. She teaches me that life's worries are easily forgotten if only we became more like children. Through her eyes I see how much love life can really give us. Every man should be blessed with a first child that is a daughter. It will help him.

Behind every successful man there is a woman? The revelation I had recently is that they are actually my life's blessings. I know the impact these women have on me, making me a better person. I am aware of, respect and treasure that with my very being. It is that knowledge that makes me successful.

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Who doesn't love food, right? What's not to love? After reading Prof. Michael Pollan's new book, you'll love it even more. Or, just hopefully, love the right kinds of food. 

To those unfamiliar with Professor Pollan, he writes often for the NY Times as a contributing editor, a journalist by trade with dozens of articles for Time, Conde Nast, Harper's and the Times. He has a background in journalism and studied at Oxford, and at Columbia. 

Pollan's writing style is amazing and fun to read. A chapter might switch from data to research to observation to suggestion in just a few paragraphs, all the while begging the reader to examine his own food practices and shortcomings. The prose is never preachy or overly scientific, and therein lies the beauty. I took the time to research, i.e. not Google, several of his sources and data points, and they do indeed add up. Readers should take the time to investigate steps taken by our government to safeguard the food 'industry' and question just whom the nexus between the government and this industry benefits. 

Unlike his previous book however, The Omnivore's Dilemma, this one is less about industry, but more to & for the consumer. Analyzing food practices and cultures centuries old, contrasted with nutritionism, a few decades old, reductionist science approach to food content, he asks the reader to make simple, better choices in their diet. Calling out a few of this 'science's' missteps (corn products, saturated fat, trans fats, etc.) he cautions basically against taking the nutrients out of the food, the food out of the diet, the diet out of the practices, and the practices out of the culture. Every misstep of ours, and therefore miscalculated health outcome, seems to have been the result of families forsaking generations-old food practices, and placing their faith in a nutritionist's test tubes and the products that come out of them. This just seems too intuitive, but we still do most of our shopping in the middle aisles of the grocery store, where these food products thrive.

While describing the values of an all-vegetarian diet, which he openly professes is far healthier, he admits to enjoying the odd serving of meat as well. The reader is given lots of options, simple advice, on better yet pragmatic choices to make while at the grocery store. The best part of the book for me, is when he talks about the relationship between our appetites, our desire for food, a plant or fruit's ripening cycles and the antioxidant and other compounds it forms as a result. It was thrilling to read about the relations between a dozen or more of nature's processes, and the purpose behind each one.

These purposes are rarely witnessed in a test tube.

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Recent developments in India prompt this naturalized-American-becoming-a dual citizen-Indian Desi to write about a few things India could learn from the US. These are in addition to, or ideally in lieu of, everything else it seems to be absorbing from the west like a sponge (needless consumerism, capitalism misconstrued as consumerism, defense spending, family values, increased use of recreational "substances" etcetera).

Since 2000, several new states have been 'created' out of existing states in India. These are Chattisgarh, Uttaranchal, Jharkhand, Delhi, Pudu/Pondicherry, the last two with the right to elect legislatures of their own. They all came about through some combination of peaceful, violent, arm-twisting, negotiated means. But they DID all came about. 

Further, on 9 Dec 2009, the national Congress government led by Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh agreed to form a seperate state in Andhra Pradesh, called Telangana and this legislature sits with the state government. This is historical for several reasons:

1. While not debating the merits of the argument or the plight of the Telangana people who have reason to think the system has disenfranchised them, India happens to be filled with such peoples and regions. We get upset when denied priority boarding ahead of a pregnant woman with 2 children. We're special. We're disillusioned by definition. The creation of Pakistan itself began with that very premise. Think about the precedent this sets. Other politicians in India sure are.
2. The region itself even with two major rivers, Krishna and Godavari, flowing through the region is incredibly arid and infertile. With rural farming and urban services (IT, manufacturing etc.) forming the two primary occupations of the South, there isn't much else by way of revenue for the region to claim; the bulk of the argument will center therefore on Hyderabad.
3. The importance of this cannot be overstated. After Bangalore, Hyderabad and Chennai control the lions' share of the IT services in India (read the world) and therefore the revenue as well. This amount was $63 Billion last year. Naturally, Telangana would want Hyderabad.
4. At this time similar tensions exist or existed in Gorkhaland (Bengal), Singur, Koda, Bengal, Tamil Nadu (of course problems always exist in Tamil Nadu). And just today, the Times of India carried a front page article on politicians in UP wanting to split that up into THREE STATES (Harit Pradesh, Bundelkhand, UP) !! We haven't even gotten to the elephants in the room - Maoists, Naxals and Kashmir.
5. Never before in the history of the country, have parts of the country been so developed, and others been so under-developed. The chasm is growing.
6. Never before in its history, has the country been less united than it is now. Even during the feudal and aristocrat days, there was the notion that this was in India, in Bharat, in Hindustan. I'm not so sure that notion exists anywhere anymore.
7. What assurances, negotiations, 2-way agreements have been formed between the "representation" of these movements and the Congress, which has been the dominant political party for the last five decades? Are we naive to assume that this is just about the people's movements?
8. What each state gets is a seat, a representation at the cabinet level and ALL the benefits therein. With the Times running an article a few months ago about how ministers in Maharashtra have had declared net worth increase several crores during their parliamentary posting, its not difficult to see what a politicians motivations might be. And that's just the declared worth. Anyone else have a problem with that?
9. What each new state gets is a new state obviously, and the need for new governing bodies, civic processes, bureaucracies, municipalities, elections, state-level funding etc. All that costs a lot of money. Wouldn't that money be better spent, removing those people out of poverty in the first place?
10. Amartya Sen conducted land breaking research on famines and the nature of their being a direct outcome of a lack of democracy. Is the real need here for a representation of these peoples at the political levels? Was a new state really necessary?
11. Elections, new school systems, lack of majority votes etc. all cost money. Where will this money come from? From all the IT revenue that Hyderabad has worked so hard to win? Is that fair?
12. Mahatma Gandhi's legacy is equal parts national leader/civil-disobedience & non-violence pioneer, but also being at the political helm during partitioning of the country into India and Pakistan. How ironic that his party's, the Congress', legacy is also equal parts reform, a form of secularism, economic growth and also the partitioning of the country into further, feuding, economically bankrupt states. Is it just a zero-sum game?
13. The straw that broke the back seemed to be a fast-unto-death attempt by an already unwell politician. Most places have judicial controls in place for threatened suicide. In India you get a state?
14. Of course if the MNS had their way, they'd declare Maharashtra another country. But lets' stick to rational arguments.

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Something as meaningful as this really helps to ground you back into reality, both when things are going unbelievably well and when nothing appears to be going well. Keep it in your back pocket. Comes in handy.

"Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. And yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, an afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four, or five times more? Perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless..."

-- Brandon Lee from The Crow DVD

-- Paul Bowles, The Sheltering Sky [original author of the quote]

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